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This Article
On Art Chicago and
The Acquisition of The Armory Show:
A Conversation with Mark Falanga
By M. Brendon MacInnis
As senior vice president of Merchandise Mart Properties,
a Chicago based trade show and property management firm that
produces trade shows, market events and conferences, Mark
Falanga was largely responsible for bringing the firm’s
resources to bear in the art world, with the purchase of several
important art fairs; most notably The Armory Show,
in New York, and Art Chicago, as well as several younger contemporary
art fairs. Mr. Falanga also holds a Ph.D in urban, technological
and environmental planning and architecture from the University
of Michigan and a Master of Fine Arts in industrial design
at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In this
interview with M, he discusses the behind-the-scenes work
that was involved in rehabilitating Art Chicago,
while pursuing an acquisition strategy that would position
Merchandise Mart Properties as a major player in today’s
art fair driven art world. We spoke at length, at the Merchandise
Mart’s headquarters in Chicago, during the week following
Art Chicago 2008.
Can you give me a little background on how you guys [Merchandise
Mart] got involved with Art Chicago?
For years we had been attending Art Chicago, we were very
familiar with the show. We knew Tom Blackman, [the former
owner of Art Chicago] and it was a show that we had expressed
interest in; it was a show that we were aware of. What drew
us to it is that the attendee base was a lot like the kinds
of people that were attracted to a lot of the things that
we run here at the Merchandise Mart. Much of our business
is in high-end residential furnishing, gift wear, and everything’s
at the very high-end — our business is essentially bringing
high-end buyers into our showrooms that are selling high-end
merchandise. That structure seemed to be similar to what was
going on at Art Chicago, and for that reason — and because
we had interest in the art market a little bit; we attended
the fair just to monitor it and to see what was going on.
When you say you “had interest in the art market,"
were you thinking at all about perhaps one day owning that
fair?
Well, I would say it was in the back of our mind.
Okay.
But mostly we were monitoring the show; we understood that
it was an important show and that it set the tone for a lot
of what was going on in the art market.
Up to that that time, had the Merchandise Mart ever bought
a fair before? Was this the first one?
Oh no, we’ve purchased a lot of trade shows, a lot of
consumer shows over the years, all over. That's one way in
which we’ve expanded. We had a model for purchasing
shows; our typical acquisition, when we purchase a trade show,
is that we keep all of their people; the founder, usually,
and all of the staff that are producing the shows. What we’ve
tried to do is off-load a lot of the non-creative aspects
of the fair production so that the people that create —
the founders — can have more time to exercise their
creativity, to expand and to try new things and to add dimensionality
to the shows that they've been involved with for years.
Can you give me an example, when you say, off-load the
“non-creative” aspects? Do you mean the people
who work to set up the fair?
It may not be a fare word to use, to say the non-creative
aspects, because I think that, you know, if a job is done
well, every job can be done creatively. But what we try to
do is get involved more in the operational aspects of the
fair.
Okay.
We try to create some efficiencies; bringing the artwork or
the merchandise to the show, helping to set up the fair, taking
down the fair — taking care of the marketing, the direct
mail, and things of that nature, where we've got a great staff
in place here. We create a lot of efficiency, because these
groups really work over a whole series of trade and consumer
shows. As a company we produce 81 different trade shows, consumers
shows and conferences a year. So, around those shows we've
created a great level of efficiency in setting fairs up and
marketing them, registering people for them. We try to leverage
that knowledge that we've created, in running all of this,
into any new art fairs that we purchase so that the founders
can really get less focused on those aspects of the fair and
more focused on what they would do now that they have financial
resources; they have the benefit of not having to worry about,
you know, in the case of an art fair, where the walls are
coming from, how to set up walls, where the lighting’s
coming from, how to get the artwork in, how to get it set
up. All of that consumes a tremendous amount of effort; if
the fair founder doesn't have to worry about that, that means
they can think about, you know, "What would I like to
do? I’m with this large company... there are a lot of
financial resources." So they can act as great entrepreneurs
without a lot of the financial constraints that an entrepreneur
would ordinarily confront.
Well, in New York, I saw a pretty dramatic example of
what you're talking about in the case of The Armory Show.
It's amazing, the difference in the physical appearance of
that show since you guys purchased it. I remember years ago
when Paul [Paul Morris] and everyone started that fair, it
was a struggle just to get the lighting set up at your booth.
I had just started M around the same time, when that show
expanded to the piers, [1999] and the people there; it's still
the same director, Katelijne, [Katelijne De Backer] were nice
enough to offer us booth in the publications section of the
fair, even though at that time our magazine was just a few
pages stapled together with a map of Chelsea... When did you
get The Armory Show?
This is the second year that we’ve produced it.
Wow, time goes...
So, anyway, we were familiar with Tom and with the show [Art
Chicago]. About Tom, we thought great things. I think he is
the one that really created the model for a successful fair;
he understood how important it was to bring quality to a fair,
how that really impacted the attendee base. I think it’s
a bit of a simple analysis to say, you know, that Art Basel
came to Miami and then that led to Art Chicago’s downfall.
That’s the conventional wisdom.
I think that certainly may have had something to do with it;
but I also think that had Tom been better equipped, financially,
had he been better equipped with an organization that could
respond to a large company like the folks that own Art Basel,
[Messe Basel] to respond to that — I think he had the
knowledge base and the vision to respond to it; but he didn’t
have the organization and he didn’t have the financial
resources to do what he probably knew needed to be done in
order to respond to that. As a result, the show went down
and it hit its lowest of low in 2006. Because we had some
familiarity with Tom, we had many conversations with him,
on the Monday prior to the show’s opening — the
show was going to open on a Thursday — so on Monday
evening, actually at six o’clock, we got a call from
Tom. Tom said, “Hey, I’m in trouble, I don’t
have any alternative. Could you guys help me with this fair?
If you don’t, it will not be produced. You’re
my last and best hope.” On Tuesday then, we evaluated
a range of options. We evaluated running the fair over on
Butler Field, where he had the tent set up, but no floor.
We looked at running it at Navy Pier, where he had run it
successfully before, so we felt that there was some protocol
there. And we looked at running it here [Merchandise Mart].
At the end of the day on Tuesday, we recognized that the only
viable option was to run it here where we had control over
all of the labor — to set the floor, to install the
walls, to get the art in, to get it set up and open.
I was there actually; we had a booth for the magazine
in that fair. I remember you had an antiques fair taking place
at the same time, on the same floor as Art Chicago.
Exactly.
And I said to myself, wow, what a great idea, to combine
those kinds of visitors in one big event. It looked like a
win-win situation — all of these people who spend money
on things they don’t need brought together…
Well, at that juncture, what we were really motivated by was
to save that fair for the city.
Sure.
We didn’t have any grand vision for acquiring the fair,
we didn’t have any grand vision for making any money.
But we knew enough about fairs and shows that if a fair loses
a cycle for one year, it’s very difficult to ever revive.
We felt that if that show didn’t go on in 2006, with
the 106 dealers that were here from all over the world, that
it’s likely that the fair never would’ve occurred
again. So, on Wednesday, at nine o’clock in the morning,
we got together with all of the dealers, over here at our
conference center.
Let me ask you, when you say "we"... At that
point, who would that be on your end? I know that the building
here, the Merchandise Mart, was once owned by the Kennedy
family, but I didn't realize until now that Chris Kennedy
[President of Merchandise Mart Properties] was so directly
involved in the operations. Was he involved in handling the
Art Chicago acquisition?
I would say, at that point, I was the person who was primarily
involved; Chris was actually out of town then, though he and
I were in constant contact. He was in High Point, North Carolina
at the time. I led the meeting on that Wednesday morning with
all of the dealers. We told them that we were going to be
producing the fair here. We told them that we had a huge staff
of hundreds of people that were going to set up the walls
— that were going to take their artwork from the loading
docks, bring it up and help them get set up; that we were
going to work around the clock and that the fair would open
on Thursday night, for the opening vernissage, as was originally
scheduled. The dealers in that room were shocked and dismayed.
They couldn’t quite believe what was going on, they
didn’t quite trust us. They thought that, you know,
we may be capable of dealing with furniture and giftware and
Hummel figures and clothing and patio furniture — but
that we really had no sensitivity to the art market. They
were concerned about how their art would be treated, all of
that. They had lots of questions, lots of concerns.
Well, I think part of the concern was just prejudice.
There was a time when the "fine art people" didn’t
want to be associated with the "design people".
Can you imagine that? Today it's all mixed together. But not
so long ago, design and fashion were words that had a negative
connotation, from a fine art perspective. And in that hierarchy,
the antiques and the decorative arts were really at the bottom.
But today you have a lot more cooperation and crossover, so
it works.
Yeah. You know, what we had was an ability to do a quick turnaround
— to get the show up and running. Not only did we get
all of the artwork up, the floor plan all set, the walls set
up; but we also mounted a massive marketing campaign. That
Wednesday and Thursday, and on through the weekend, we bought
a lot of radio advertising; we bought newspaper advertising;
we went and changed 100 bus backs that were advertising, promoting
Art Chicago over at Butler Field, to be at Merchandise Mart;
we put signage up all around Butler Field and ran trolleys
from Butler Field to bring visitors to the Merchandise Mart.
We printed directories, and, you know, it was like one thing
after another. So, what happened was, the attendee base was
something like 27,000, I mean people came to the fair. There
was a lot of press coverage on it; it was a big issue. It
was an amazing thing. During that fair then, we negotiated
an arrangement with Tom whereby we would purchase the assets
of the show.
What were the assets?
Well, you know, the assets of any show are effectively an
exhibitor — a consumer show is essentially a list of
exhibitors and the trademarks and the names. So that's what
we were really acquiring, the right to produce a show called
Art Chicago in the future.
Did Tom actually own that fair?
It was never entirely clear to me, the ownership... Yeah,
Tom was the owner.
When did he become the owner of that fair? I thought;
didn't it start out as being owned by a couple of dealers
or something like that?
For as long as we’ve known Tom being associated with
that fair, he had been the owner of it. We had no knowledge
during the time of this transaction that anyone else was involved.
So anyway, we finalized our arrangements with him. We recognized
then, that really what we were buying was a show that had
all but died.
Okay.
We then went on a mission to learn more about the show. We
learned a lot during the fair; we talked to a lot of people
and we quickly put together a host committee, a group of people
that have great knowledge of the art market to educate us
and give us direction as to what we should do. We took a rather
linear approach for 2007. We first recognized that we had
to build it back, and bring a much better group of galleries
to the fair in 2007 than what were here in 2006, in order
to survive. And we had to prove to the art marketplace that
we were a legitimate art show producer, because there was
great skepticism that we weren’t qualified to do so.
So we got great advice; and what we felt we needed to do was
to first get support locally. By locally, I mean we focused
on the Chicago Art Dealers Association. We felt that if we
had their support to produce the show then we could at least
go out to others and say that we are being supported at home.
We felt that if we didn’t get that Chicago support,
it would be very difficult to get the support of anyone else.
The Chicago Art Dealers Association then, after the show,
was really divided into three camps. One camp was for us producing
the show; about a third of the board members were. They felt
that because of the experience of 2006, we deserved the right
to move ahead with it.
Was there a new director? Did Tom retain the title of
director?
We hired — we brought Tom in as part of our acquisition.
Okay.
But he was not directly involved with the production of the
show; that was the advice that we heard loud and clear —
that Tom was really associated with the demise of the fair,
and a complication that resulted in the show being produced
here. The art community felt very strongly that Tom should
be disassociated with the show. He acted for us as an adviser
and an educator; he gave us great insight to the art marketplace;
he gave us great sensitivity and told us the right things
to do, and, you know, he’s a great adviser. But that
was the extent of his involvement with the show. He was also
involved in some other activities here related to our other
consumer shows.
I see.
So, anyway, with the Chicago Art Dealers Association, about
a third of the group wanted or felt that we deserved the right
to produce the fair — they supported us. During that
whole thing, DMG emerged with a fellow named Mark Lyman [Founder/Director
of SOFA (Sculpture Objects & Functional Art), a DMG world
media company] who runs the SOFA show…
Yeah, I know him. In fact he was interviewed for an article
in M about a year ago. [May 2007 issue, Vol. 10, No. 9]
And he raised his hand and said “You know what? I want
to run an art show here in Chicago.” So, a third of
the group thought that Mark was a legitimate show producer,
because he had produced the SOFA show, and he was the horse
that they bet on. The other third felt that, well this is
done — there should be no more art fair in Chicago.
So we worked for about a month, convincing the board at the
Chicago Art Dealers Association that they should go with us.
We convinced them that we were going to invest heavily in
producing the fair, we convinced them that the fair was going
to be re-cast and re-created; we were going to involve all
of the cultural institutions throughout the city to make this
a real Chicago fair — which had never been done before.
And we convinced them that we were going to go on a mission
to attract quality back into the fair.
How were you going to do that?
By pursuing galleries throughout the world that were much
better than the class of galleries that was in the show in
2006.
Who did that actually? Did you have a curator or how
did you…
Well, we then went out and hired some great people that understood
the art marketplace; like we do in all of our other businesses.
In all of our businesses there are people working in them
that were recruited from those businesses; they have sensitivity
to the business, they understand how the business operates.
So, we went out and started hiring some people, and a key
person we hired in that regard was a fellow named Tony Karman
who is now the vice president of the fair, the vice president
of Art Chicago. Tony had worked with the fair for many years,
he had worked with Tom Blackman, he was very well regarded,
very well liked amongst the community — and Tony had
a clear vision, a clear mission. And his mission was to attract
quality dealers back into the fair. Tony then traveled the
world, he went to every art fair that you could possibly think
of everywhere. He started convincing the gallery owners that
we were investing in this fair, that we were in it for the
long haul. He convinced them to trust us, and come back in.
Did you offer any special incentives? A special price
break for some dealers?
I would say that we didn’t rely on that… That
wasn’t our — wasn’t the first thing out
of our bag. For the most part there were really no financial
incentives given, but what we did do before Tony went out
on his selling mission was that we re-created to show. We
outlined a massive marketing campaign, we got about 65 or
70 cultural partners throughout the city to say yes; they
would participate with us. People like Susanne Ghez of the
Renaissance Society joined us, and she was curating a new
insights exhibit which was really attracting the best students
from the best MFA programs throughout the school to exhibit
their work. We had people like Richard Wright who runs a great
modern auction house [60,000-square-foot facility on the fringe
of Chicago's West Loop] to participate with us, and we put
together a host committee that included the top museum directors
and curators and others to help guide our efforts, and to
lend their names and credibility to the fair, so that when
Tony went out he could say Art Chicago is different than it
ever was. The whole city is involved, many credible people
are now involved, and they’ve put their trust in this
fair. We’ve got the full, unanimous endorsement from
the Chicago Art Dealers Association. So, you know, we could
say that you, great dealer, trust us to do all of the right
things here — and trust me, because I’m telling
you this is a great organization, we are going to produce
a great fair. Then slowly, those dealers came back into the
fair, in 2007.
I guess you could count me in that category too, of people
who gave up on Art Chicago, but then slowly came around to
take a second look. The roster of galleries in the 2008 show,
together with seeing what you’ve done with The Armory
Show in New York, since that acquisition, is what really persuaded
me come back and see what’s going on here. It’s
really, pretty impressive.
Yeah. So this goes back to 2007 now — then we realized
that if we didn’t bring great dealers, a step up in
quality and the type of dealers we were attracting to the
show, that we would’ve failed in our effort to convince
the art community that we can produce a fair. So we recognized
that we had a year honeymoon here to prove ourselves, and
you know, as it turned out the 2007 fair was terrific; the
galleries that came in were much better than the galleries
several years prior, the attendance rose from — I’m
not quite sure of the number in 2006 — but let’s
say 27,000, and it rose to 40,000. A huge attendance came
in, great promotion, great events and activities that tied
into the city.
Do you work with the satellite fairs? There’s one
in particular that I’m familiar with, the one that Michael
Workman does, called Bridge. Did you guys consider buying
that fair too, or else doing something with them?
Well, they produced their fair here in 2007, and, you know,
they chose not to come back in 2008. And when they decided
that; that’s when we became a little bit focused on
Volta [a satellite fair that takes place during Art Basel
in Switzerland, started by Chicago based gallery owner Kavi
Gupta who also started the invitational fair called NEXT]
in producing their NEXT show here. We felt that to have an
emerging gallery — emerging art component to the fair
was a very important dimension that would help attract collectors.
I saw the Volta fair last month, the New York edition
that you just launched, and I noticed that, there too, you
put together an amazing roster of participating galleries.
Some of these galleries have also shown in the Art Basel fair…
Yeah.
And I think they signed up for that fair [Volta] mainly
because; two things, one of course as you pointed out they
can see that people are investing in this fair, but I think
that it was really the coup of you’re getting The Armory
Show into your portfolio that’s changed everything.
Because of that, people now look at Chicago in a whole new
light, they think; hey, these are the guys [Merchandise Mart]
who own The Armory Show, we want to be part of this too.
Yeah. I think, you know, when we started understanding the
marketplace better, the subtleties and complexities of the
art market, we recognized that it’s much more complex
than any of the other businesses with which we are involved.
And we recognized the importance of bringing great people
into the fold, people that really knew the business. When
we started looking at who was available, and how we could
attract top caliber talent into our employ, we recognized
that the best people really own their fairs. Acquisitions
became really important — not only to acquire a fair,
but also to, more importantly, have excess to really fabulous
people that were running these events.
That sounds like the Warren Buffett [Berkshire Hathaway]
model for buying companies; I’ve heard that one key
to his success with acquisitions is that he doesn’t
try to run these companies after he buys them.
Exactly.
He identifies what works, and keeps those elements in
place.
Exactly, and so with The Armory Show, as good as that fair
is, our interest was really in gaining access to Paul Morris
and to Katalina De Backer and that whole group, because they
had great credibility in the art marketplace, they had run
a fair for, you know, 14 years, that was regarded as one of
the best fairs — or the best fair in the United States.
And that gave us, you know, not only great legitimacy, but
great access to people with great ideas. It became a very
important component for us. In a similar fashion that’s
what we really found in Kavi Gupta and his group, who were
producing the Volta show in Basel. We credit Kavi for bringing
in all of those dealers, the emerging dealers here to Chicago
for the NEXT Show. That show is run very differently than,
say, Michael Workman’s show, or from all the other shows
that we produce. It’s a curatorial show, an invitational.
Kavi’s judgment, and his group’s judgment is so
good that they know who to ask, and those people come in because
of it.
When you purchase these fairs, what kind of money are
we talking about?
We really don’t talk about that. But I can say that
going from 2007 to 2008, we recognized that we had to show
continuous improvement. So in 2007 we proved ourselves, in
showing that we could do what we set out to do. We, I think,
established a lot of credibility in the art marketplace, and
we had many dealers that did very well — who then became
ambassadors for us and started really getting the word out
that the Mart [Merchandise Mart] is really serious about this
business, in doing great things. And we, this year, made further
commitments; we renovated our 12th floor, [where Art Chicago
takes place] spent millions of dollars to create a world-class
venue on the 12th floor with the gallery spaces. We brought
Next into the fold, with Art Chicago. Probably some 40 dealers
who worked with us in 2007 participated with us in 2008, and
we had much more time to plan a more robust campaign; we had
30 museum groups, about 1000 people from 30 different museums
— curatorial groups and buying groups. There were about
9000 people who registered through our VIP program. In terms
of the results of the fair, and our polling during and after
the fair, 96% of the exhibitors told us that they wanted to
come back next year in 2009, of those 34% said that they wanted
additional space. To us, that’s really the best indication
that we have as to how the exhibitors felt about the show.
I see.
And a lot of times you may hear that the sales were good or
great or mediocre; we don’t do polling in that regard.
Well, I’ll tell you something, from a journalist
standpoint, we don’t report sales figures given to us
by dealers or PR people anyway, because we know that none
of this information can be verified. Even when an art fair
puts out a press release that says millions of dollars of
art was sold, it means nothing because in this business the
people who know don’t talk about these things.
Exactly.
We basically look at the roster of participating dealers,
and what the crowds look like; not just the size, but who’s
coming, in determining what to say about a fair. There are
also anecdotal conversations that we may have with dealers
in the fair, people we feel we know, who serve as a kind of
bellwether for what we report back and to our readers. Anything
you plan to do different next year?
I think we’ll hold the The Artist Project [a project
that allowed artists to represent themselves during the fair,
much to the chagrin of participating dealers] on different
dates than Art Chicago, and we’ll be evaluating feedback
from dealers to see where else we can make improvements.
Thanks for being so generous with your time; I think
we’ve covered pretty much all of the main points here.
Quite an impressive narrative.
Thank you for showing the interest to come in.
Ed. Note:
Merchandise Mart Properties, Inc. (MMPI) is a trade show and
property management firm. Vornado Realty Trust, owners of
MMPI, based in New York City, is a fully integrated equity
real estate investment trust. MMPI Art Group is comprised
of Art Chicago, NEXT, The Armory Show, Volta Basel, Volta
NY and the Toronto International Art Fair, all owned and produced
by Merchandise Mart Properties, Inc.
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This Article
Olafur Eliasson
MoMA and PS1 Contemporary Art Center
By Mary Hrbacek
Olafur Eliasson aligns his strikingly radical sculptural
projects with the physical laws that govern structures that
exist in the larger cosmos. He recalls artists of the Italian
Renaissance who immersed themselves not only in artistic innovations
but in scientific exploration involving physical phenomena.
He sculpts the architectural space with changes in light and
temperature that occur subtly, as they do in nature, re-creating
with infinitesimal variation the soothingly gradual physical
modifications that transform noon to dusk, twilight to night
or spring to summer.
Eliasson employs reflective surfaces with great insight in
a variety of forms that bring the limitless particles of energy
that comprise matter into visible interactive equivalents,
in his kaleidoscopic prisms and segmented infinite mirrors.
Looking at this work, one can experience the sensation of
an un-ending vista comparable to the view of a starry night
sky.
He carved the space of an enormous room with a huge reflective
disc, fixed aloft that tilts slightly to and fro, incorporating
the floor within the spatially reorienting ceiling reflection.
The artist focuses in particular on the physical and psychic
response of the individual viewer. He wants you to "take
your time." He intends to nurture personal differences
by cultivating sensitivity to his altered environments that
re-creates nature's equivalents with fresh perspectives. Eliasson's
reverse waterfalls flow up, twisting the original gravitational
law, obliterating the expectation of water that cascades down,
not up, hill. A fan that swings in an arc back and forth,
suspended from the ceiling, elicits viewer misgivings regarding
the security of its connection.
This mesmerizing body of works can exert gradual influence
or forceful, slightly threatening physical intimations. Eliasson's
neon gold corridor ceiling projects harsh, strong light, recalling
the blinding noon sunlight of a desert town. This piece leads
forward to a stainless steal wall work that reflects the gold
light like a rock face at sunset. The work entitled Beauty
catches mist illuminated in the disorientating darkness of
a basement vault. This place is a province of beauty combined
with mild hints of danger. The piece re-creates a darkened
cave that beckons the viewer to advance towards a light that
glows in the recesses of its dark precinct.
He also employs photographic works as studies for some of
his installation concepts. His eight photographic series of
glaciers, islands, horizons, caves and Icelandic ice flows
present a view of the strange, rugged terrain in nature's
changing vistas. In this experimental retrospective, Eliasson
re-creates visions that entwine environmental installations
with atmospheric elements, re-combining the space of the landscape
with a human perspective within the inner track of the museum
that hosts and cultivates them.
Eliasson carves breathlessly clear, sweepingly fresh visions
of modulated, uniquely altered sculptural expanses. The artist
sculpts with light and models with space. His canvas is a
kaleidoscope of colored prisms that are reflected and multiplied
to infinity, in a boundless expanding crescendo. The essence
of inter-cosmic space is captured and revealed comprehensively.
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